Headphones are vital when you are recording music. At this point in my life I have probably spent more time wearing headphones than not. It doesn’t matter if you’re editing tracks in your room, recording new vocals for your latest YouTube video, or simply listening to your favorite artist. It makes sense to buy a pair of quality headphones for your home studio, but what are the best studio headphones? Are some headphones better for recording than others? What are the different types of headphones? Read on and I will answer those questions!

For those of you who just want the answer as quick as possible:

The best studio headphones for mixing and mastering music are the $300 HiFiMan HE 400S.

Using Headphones vs Monitors

We all know that studio monitors are an important equipment to have to get professional mixes. So, why do you need headphones for your home studio?

The answer is that you need them for recording. When recording you obviously only want to record your instrument or singing right? If you have your monitors turned up while recording then your mic will pick up everything coming out of it. This can cause feedback, among other issues, and will not produce a good sounding track, so you will need to mute your monitors while recording.

You still need to hear what you are actually recording though, and that is why you need headphones. They act as your monitor.

While you can get away with recording without any type of monitor at all, and I do sometimes prefer to record this way, you are really limiting yourself. Usually when I record without my headphones I am just roughing out a song or instrumental part that will not actually be used in any finish song. Doing it this way feels more natural and I can focus on the creative part of my music, and not get caught up in making everything perfect.

When I am ready to make the actual song I will be publishing to YouTube though, I always record the vocals and each instrument on separate takes. This lets me focus on getting the guitar part perfect without worrying about hitting every note perfectly, and then later to give my best vocal performance even if I miss a note on the guitar. I can do multiple takes of each part until it is perfect.

When you produce music this way you can really create a lot of interesting layers with multiple instruments and vocal harmonies. Once I complete a layer I then run it through my headphones while recording the next. This is called “overdubbing”. It’s kind of the same thing as listening to a metronome or click track while recording.

If I didn’t mute my monitors and played the recorded layers or the click track over them, then my mic would pick them up and create all kinds of terrible noise on the recording.

On the other hand if you’re using your headphones to mix, then it is more important that you have very high quality sound. It’s less important that the headphone noise is completely isolated. Nice quality studio monitors are usually the best way to consistently get high quality mixes, but sometimes headphones are more practical.

What Are The Types of Headphones?

There are 3 types of studio headphones available and each one has its use in a home studio:

Open Back Studio Headphones

These headphones sit “on” the ear and do not enclose it. Open studio headphones generally give you the best sound. They reproduce the true sound of a recording and are similar to studio monitors. Open back headphones sound kind of like a concert hall and give a very “open” sound, mixing in a little of the ambient noise around you to making it seem like the sound is everywhere. The obvious downside is that the sound coming out of the headphones escapes into the world around you. If you are in your studio recording then your microphones will pick up the sound from your headphones and get recorded or cause feedback.

Open back are the best studio headphones for mixing and mastering tracks. They are also great for just listening to music. If you have an apartment with a lot of neighbors, open back headphones are a good alternative to monitors when mixing at 3am.

Closed Back Studio Headphones

As the name implies the back of the headphones are closed to the world. Closed headphones (sometimes called “over the ear” headphones or circumaural) generally have a cup with a hard back that sits “over” your ear, completely enveloping it. The cups isolate you from any outside sound and vise versa. The music playing from your headphones will not be heard by anyone or anything but you. The downside to closed back headphones though is that they don’t give the best “true” sound, and they make it sound like the music is “in” your head instead of the open air sound you get from open back headphones.

Closed back are the best studio headphones when recording music. You can safely play a click track or previously recorded tracks to play by without your mics picking it up.

Semi-Open Back Studio Headphones

Semi-open back headphones claim to be the best both worlds. They supposedly give you better sound quality and the “open” sound of open back, and provide some sound isolation like closed back. For our purposes you can consider semi-open to be open. They do not fully isolate their noise from your microphones and will interfere with recording.

Semi-open back headphones are best used in the same settings as open back. Don’t worry about the term semi-open. If a semi-open headphone sounds and feels better to you than an open one, use the semi-open one.

What do I use?

90% of the time I use the industry favorite Sennheiser HD 280 Pro closed back headphones. They are very affordable and are used in just about every studio I have been in. They are lightweight, comfortable, ergonomic, and produce a great sound.

They completely isolate sound from escaping the headphones and any external sound from getting in. I put them on and I am in my own little world without distractions.

I have used the same pair of HD 280 Pro’s for over 8 years and they still work as well as the day I got them. About a year ago the ear pads and head band pad thing started to get worn and fall apart so I simply went on Amazon and ordered replacements. I popped them on and presto! Good as new. I can’t recommend them enough.

The best cheap studio headphones I know of are the Sony MDR7506. They go for about $80. I really wouldn’t consider any cheaper headphones as the quality really goes down quickly.

The other 10% of the time I wear a pair of HiFiMan HE 400S open back headphones I picked up a couple years ago. They sound great and do have a more “open” sound compared to the Sennheisers. I almost always use monitors to do my mixing, but when needed I pop on the HiFiMans.

A quick video giving a great explanation of the difference between open and closed back headphones:

Conclusion

What are the best studio headphones? Well that depends, you have to consider the different types of headphones and what you are going to be using them for. If you are going to use them primarily for recording then you definitely want to get a pair of closed back headphones like theSennheiser HD 280 Pros. If your studio setup doesn’t allow you to crank up your monitors when you need to mix your music, or you just prefer headphones for mixing, then you need an open back headphone like the HiFiMan HE 400S.

Put some thought into getting the right headphones, because if you’re anything like me then you will be spending more time wearing them than not!

The OontZ Angle 3 Bluetooth Speaker is a little 5 inch triangular speaker is built to resist moderate water splashing while promising impressive sound output and wireless Bluetooth connection. How does the sound compare to other similarly priced speakers like the Zenbre or GJT Lp? How water resistant is the OontZ? Read on for the answers!

Setup and Usability

There is no setup or assembly required when with this speaker. Just pop it out of the box, charge it, and you’re ready to go. There are 2 ways to connect this speaker to your music. You can either use the included 3.5 mm audio cable or connect via Bluetooth. If you’re like me then you play most of your music through your phone or tablet, in which case the Bluetooth makes the most sense.

I found it pretty easy to pair the speaker with my devices using the Bluetooth pairing button. Simply set your device to look for new Bluetooth devices and push the button on the speaker to get them to talk to each other. If you use the 3.5 mm cable to connect then you will have to open the rubber flap covering both the 3.5 mm port as well as the mini-USB power port. Exposing these ports does diminish the water resistant capabilities of the OontZ Angle, so I would avoid doing that if you are going to be using this speaker where it is sure to get wet like the shower.

The thing that probably annoys me most about this speaker is that the power charging port is mini-USB instead of the much more common micro-USB that is found on all non-Apple phones and tablets. Not only that, but while the mini-USB cable is included, the power adapter is not. This means that you will either have to plug the power cord into your laptop or provide your own adapter. This may or may not be an issue for you, but it did annoy me.

The Bluetooth pairing button also functions as a answerend call button. The Angle has speakerphone capabilities built-in and while it does work in a pinch, like if you’re in the pool and can’t reach your phone, I wouldn’t rely on it too much. The call sound quality is fine, but the internal microphone isn’t great quality so you have to be pretty close to the speaker in order for the other person to understand you. This isn’t really something I care too much about though since there are very few times I can imagine I would use this feature.

The only other buttons on the speaker are the volume up and down buttons. They sit on the backtop of the speaker next to the Bluetoothphone button and are easily found and press. Not much to say here. The + makes it louder and the – makes it quieter.

The Angle does not have buttons to allow you to skip tracks or pause the music. If you want to do either of those things you will need to access the device the music is playing from.

Sound Quality

The sound quality of these little wireless Bluetooth speakers comes down to expectations. If you expect concert hall music with the deep bass and perfect high ends you get from your 50.3 Bose surround sound, you’re going to be disappointed. However, if you compare them to similarly priced speakers I think you will be pleasantly surprised at how good they sound.

They put out an impressive amount of loudness for their size and maintain clarity all the way up to the loudest setting. The sound quality is best in the mid-range and have a decent amount of high end detail. Due to the small size bass is of course the weakest range, though if you have realistic expectations you wont be disappointed.

I couldn’t find the exact driver used in this OontZ in any of the documentation, but from what I can tell it looks like they are using two 45 mm acoustic drivers and a passive sub woofer. There is an air grill on the bottom of the device and I found that if I tipped the speaker on it’s side then the sound quality had a noticeable improvement.

Build Quality

As I mentioned earlier, I really like the different triangle shape of the OontZ Angle. It sets itself apart stylistically from all the other wireless Bluetooth speakers and their boxy designs. The base is black and you have the option of getting black, blue, pink, red, or gray grills.

The overall dimensions of the box are 5.3 inches wide, 3 inches deep, and 2.7 inches tall. The weight comes in at about 9 oz, which makes it pretty light weight. The small size makes it ideal for portability, but also limits the sound quality as noted above.

I like the clean lines of the speaker, the grills are sharp looking with their vibrant colors and are ridged enough to protect the drivers. The plastic body has a nice soft finish to it. The buttons feel a bit cheap, but I haven’t had any performance issues with them. On the bottom you will find 2 rubber feet that will keep the speaker from sliding around when playing all but the most bass heavy music.

The microphone used for the speaker phone feature isn’t very good, though that isn’t this speakers primary function. If you want a Bluetooth speaker for the purpose of using it as a speaker phone or conference phone then their are certainly better products out there that are built around optimizing that use.

After splashing a moderate amount of water on it in my sink and using it a couple times in the shower, I can tell you that it is certainly water resistant. It is not water proof though, so don’t try submerging it in your pool or dropping it in the bathtub.

A minor annoyance I found was the bright blue LED power indicator on the front. There is no way to turn it off or dim it. This really only bothered me at night time, and is only barely worth mentioning.

The 2200 mAh Li-ion battery lasts between 8-10 hours of constant use, which I was more than happy with. It took me about 5 hours to charge fully, but I just plug it in overnight and it’s ready to go in the morning. There is a battery indicator life that flashes when charging and solid when fully charged.

The included speaker carrying bag is useful and seems to hold up pretty well.

Pros

Respectable sound quality when you take the price point and size of this little Bluetooth speaker into consideration

Very easy to setup and use.

Inexpensive. At less than $30 this is a very good entry level speaker

Impressive battery life

Great portability. Small and lightweight means it doesn’t take up much space in my bag and I don’t feel it when carrying it around.

Cons

Mini-USB charging cable instead of Micro-USB.

No included power adapter

Bright blue LED indicator light on the front

Here is a quick video comparing the new OontZ Angle 3 with the older OontZ Angle Plus:

Conclusion

If you’re looking for an inexpensive portable Bluetooth speaker, then the OontZ Angle is a good choice. This little thing is made with the purpose of allowing you to play music anywhere, anytime regardless of weather or environment. If you accept what this speaker was made for and don’t expect it to produce outstanding hi-fi sound, then you will be happy.

I keep mine in the shower with me and have been very happy with it. It’s small enough to stay out of the way and produces more than enough volume and clarity.